Car plows into bike race in Mexico, 1 dead
A car has plowed into a bike race along a highway near the US-Mexico border, killing one and injuring 10 others.
Police investigator Jose Alfredo Rodriguez says the 28-year-old driver was apparently drunk and fell asleep when he crashed into the race.
A photograph taken by a city official shows bicyclists and equipment being hurled high in to the air by the collision.
Rodriguez says Juan Campos was charged with killing Alejandro Alvarez, 37, of Monterrey.
Authorities say the wreck happened 15 minutes into the race along a highway between Playa Bagdad and Matamoros.
Campos says he is an American citizen living in Brownsville, Texas. U.S. consulate spokesman Todd Huizinga said officials were looking into whether Americans were involved.
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I look at the picture and wonder if the cop could have shielded the bicyclists from the oncoming moron. There must have been time, after all someone with a camera had time to turn and watch, and one bicyclist had time to go to the side of the road and stop, just ahead of the cluster.
And I think of how lucky that one bicyclist is, the one on left side of the cluster who's still on his bike, inches from being hit like the rest of the group. But then a guy is falling on him, otherwise head first onto the road.
Look at the flying helmet, probably from the guy who's flying on the leftmost side. And the other stuff flying... no doubt that the car has some speed at point of impact. From the angle and blur, it looks like the stuff was still traveling up.
Anyway, quite a tragedy, and seeing a picture of it really drives home the story more than if it had just been an article. I would have thought that the 10 injured ones simply fell like how you see in the French Tour, aka Tour de France. I wouldn't have imagined that they had all tasted the impact, that the car mowed them all down.
Imagine being one of them... you got up that morning excited about riding in the race, it starts, you're going along and talking with friends or trying to get in a decent spot... then... a POS drunk guy passes out while driving in his POS car, and runs you over. Now you're hoping you won't die like the other guy, or that you won't be paralyzed, or that you won't be in pain for the rest of your life.
Yep, doing just about anything can get ya killed.
